Tag Archives: media

Give Chris Evans the chancellors’ job

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David Cameron’s first criticism of the budget speech was that it was delivered with all the enthusiasm of someone reading out the telephone directory. So I assume he thinks the job should be given to a presenter.

Chris Evans
Chris Evans

I switched off – that’s the prerogative of a listener – assuming that, as the opposition leader’s prime criticism, there was little to follow.

Presentation over content is the scourge of the modern age. Make your talk glitzy enough and no one will notice you have nothing to say.

David Cameron

So if David Cameron is elected to power and you want to be Chancellor now would be a good time to put in some broadcasting hours to up your game. Or perhaps David Cameron himself should be given a radio show of his own. If he wants even more popularity he should be a gameshow host, “Vote or No Vote“, or “Who wants to be a Millionaire Tax Exile” with a “Giveaway Budget Jackpot“. The audience figures would be a painful gauge of his popularity.

This is not a defence of Alistair Darling’s budget, just another example of how easily David Cameron can get up ones nose, in the same league as Noel Edmunds and Chris Tarrant.

Capital day

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I’m at my son’s house in London, staying overnight before a workshop day in the capital tomorrow. The is the fourth workshop day I’ve run as part of the Women’s Interfaith Media Literacy project.
I’ll run two short workshops to experience the storytelling part of digital storytelling while other practitioners pass on their skills in print media, broadcasting, and PR. Previous days have been in Bradford, Leicester, Coventry and now London. No matter where I go, I find that people love telling stories, but many don’t know where to start – or finish!
So I will use my Magic Story Bag to see what secrets it reveals and then teach them how to structure those revelations into a story script. Behind all the best journalism is a good story and the best writing is storytelling. What’s your story?

Contestants not paid?

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I know it was cheesy and some of the acts were dreadful, but it can’t be right that the contestants in the BBC Show The One and Only were not paid. When I think of that really nice guy, who performed as Frank Sinatra, not being paid – he worked so hard and came in second. He must have lost out on his day job. I just hope he gets lots of bookings now to make up for Endemol’s stinginess.

Endemol has hit back at accusations from actors’ union Equity that it should have paid contestants who took part in BBC1 tribute act show The One and Only. Equity questioned the legality of not paying contestants at least minimum wage, as the show has required acts to waive their protections under working time laws, as well as assign all rights in their performances to Endemol, which makes the show through its subsidiary Initial.The union contrasted this approach with BBC1’s in-house talent shows How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria? and Any Dream Will Do, in which all finalists had industry-standard contracts with pay rates well above minimum wage.  

You’re probably asking “Why does he care?” and I’ve probably blown the credibility of this blog – but I read this in Broadcast and thought – this isn’t right. So now I’ve had my say.